It is not just the safe and effective movement of aircraft during flight that has a role to play in the smooth handling of air traffic. Their movements on the ground are also of great importance in this regard. After landing, the aircraft must be moved from its landing position to a parked position which is commonly known as a gate. The task of the pilot is to move the aircraft quickly and safely to the gate notified to him by a control facility (e.g., a control center in an airport control tower or location). In such cases, the landing position and the parking position can be several kilometers away from each other.
Pilots in such cases sometimes have the problem after landing of not being immediately able to readily find their bearings. The reasons for this can, for example be, size of an airport, sudden change of a reference environment from extensive airspace to a comparatively narrow ground area of the airport, difficulties with visibility, and so on. In many cases, especially if flying into the airport for the first time, pilots may have vague information about where their intended parking position is located. In addition, radio frequencies of the ground control which give them such information may be heavily used and a pilot may need to wait for taxi clearance to the allocated gate. In some cases, the airport signs, on taxiways for example, may not be optimally standardized as yet.
The problem occurs especially if for reasons of weather or safety, for example the aircraft have to fly into alternate airports. Those piloting the aircraft may not be directly familiar with the layout on the ground at these airports since they might have rarely or never flown into them.
Further, a ground marshaller guiding an aircraft to halt at the gate using glowing sticks may be prone to erroneous signal or could lead to misrepresentation by the ground marshaller or misinterpretation by the pilot. This problem can intensify under poor weather conditions. Furthermore, pilot turning an aircraft to take it through a defined path could possibly overshoot or undershoot the path and can misguide the aircraft. Also, during an emergency landing situation, runway overruns or during insufficient braking conditions, the aircraft can cross a defined exit from a runway to the arrival gate. In such situations, the pilot has to rely on ad hoc ground navigation to navigate the aircraft from the runway until he sees the ground marshaller. In addition, pilot misidentification of gates can be time consuming that may lead to an aircraft coming in close proximity to other ground objects around the area. At some airports, ground traffic handling means in that careful sequencing of an aircraft in and out of gate areas is critical. A single aircraft out of place or sequence can affect the taxi clearances for many aircrafts waiting to depart or those waiting for gate clearance.
Thus, delays in movement of an aircraft on landing runways and taxiways and at other parking positions can have a negative effect on entire air and ground traffic at the airport. In many cases, such events can be responsible for contributing to the delays in arrivals and departures.
Currently, one approach requires the aircraft cockpit crew to carry aircraft maps with geographical details of the destination airport, diversion airports and airports along the flight path which can be flown in emergencies. The use of such maps can be time consuming as it requires that the pilot quickly transition from a highly automated navigation environment to a manual one. Then, the map view has to be reconciled with what the pilot can see from the aircraft, for example, landmarks or other features. Furthermore, if such maps are used, it is important that the maps are of current versions. For airports with frequent construction works and changing open and closed taxiways, this can present a problem.
Another approach requires a controller of the ground control to direct the pilot to a position provided using voice radio communication. In such cases, it should be taken into account that the radio frequencies on the ground and in the air may be heavily used to such an extent that there are programs which are aiming to reduce the traffic significantly.
Yet another approach requires using “visual guidance system,” in which light sources (known as beacons) are let into a centerline of the taxiway to show the pilots their route to the parking position by means of trail of green lights. This approach can be expensive to implement and requires maintenance of the guidance pathways.
Yet another technique is based on navigation at an airport and in the surrounding airspace on global positioning system (GPS) navigation and satellite—assisted positioning, which are more complex to implement and does not address many of the above mentioned problems associated with the taxiing and guidance of an aircraft.